HOLLYWOOD – A movie following a young Barack and Michelle Obama on their first date on a particularly hot day in Chicago hit theatres earlier this month.
Southside With You portrays the era when Barack Obama was 28 and trying to sort out what his next move should be.
Parker Sawyers and Tika Sumpter star as the future president and first lady in the directorial debut of writer-director Richard Tanne.
The film is not a revealing exposé or a glimpse into the president’s dark side. Despite some digs at Barack’s ego and allusions to a past proclivity for dating white women exclusively, Tanne’s years of research presented him with a largely flattering, admirable portrait of these now iconic figures.
The film premiered at this year’s Sundance Film Festival.
The Hollywood Reporter, in a review, calls it a “perceptive, intelligent, entirely credible imagining of how these two very bright young lawyers broke the ice during a long afternoon and evening in Chicago in 1989.”
Southside With You was released on Aug 19.
